JOURNAL OF CROP PRODUCTION AND PROCESSING
Year:2019 | Volume:9 | Issue:3|Papers Count:15

Winter cold is a significant damaging factor in fruit trees specially stone fruits. Relative resistance of 20 local and introduced sweet cherries (Prunus avium) to winter cold in artificial cold condition and its association with electrical conductivity and a number of morphological traits including trunk diameter, shoot diameter, anthocyanine and lenticels frequencies was studied in year 2011. In February, dormant shoots and buds were collected and treated in a freezer with temperatures decreasing from 4 C. Then, cold damage was determined based on percentage of discoloration from green to brown. Results showed variability of shoot and bud cold tolerance among different genotypes/cultivars. Cold damage to buds was higher than shoots and they showed significantly positive correlation. In both organs, Albaloogilas Daneshkadeh was rated as the most resistant and Meshkinshahr as the most susceptible genotypes. According to the observed responses to the low temperature treatment, the germplasm was divided in three relative susceptibility groups including highly susceptible (10%), relatively susceptible (15%) and relatively resistant (75%) and no genotype was completely resistant. Accordingly, it is concluded that most genotypes/cultivars studied were relatively tolerant to winter cold. A correlation existed between cold damage and shoot diameter, indicating that this species is more cold-susceptible at the seedling stage. Considering low correlation between cold damage and lenticel numbers/anthocyanin pigment intensity, these traits are not appropriate criteria for winter cold tolerance selection in cherry.

Baby corn is a premature ear of maize that is harvested as dehusked vegetable corn at 2-3 days after silking before fertilization. No enough attention has been paid to this kind of maize in the literature. In order to investigate the effect of planting density and pattern on yield and some qualitative and morphological traits in baby corn hybrid KSC403su a field experiment was conducted at College of Agriculture, Shiraz University, Shiraz, Iran in 2014. The treatments were plant density at four levels: 100, 125, 150 and 175 thousands plant ha-1 and three planting patterns: one, two and three rows which arranged in factorial based on a randomized complete block design (RCBD) with three replications. The results showed that yield, solar radiation, total soluble solid (TTS) and a majority of morphological traits of baby corn were significantly affected by the treatments and their interactions. With increasing of the number of rows and plant density, leaf area and plant height were increased, while the number of tillers per plant, number of ears per plant, husked and dehusked ear yield, husked and dehusked ear weight and ear diameter were decreased. The highest husked and dehusked ear yield were obtained in 150 thousands plant ha-1 and single row planting pattern with average of 1834 and 9128 Kg ha-1, respectively. In general, one row planting pattern at 150 thousands plant ha-1 were considered as the most suitable treatments and could be suggested for achieving acceptable yield and appropriate quality.

Safflower (Carthamus tinctorius L. ) is a multipurpose plant; since its seeds contain multi-saturated fatty acids it is grown as an oilseed plant. Drought stress at late season, reduces both seed yield and quality. On the other hand, the use of nanoparticles due to their high contact surfaces can reduce the effects of environmental stresses. Hence, the present study was carried out to investigate the effects of Nano-silicon oxide (10 and 20 mM), Nano-titanium dioxide (25 and 50 mM) and Nano-zinc (30 and 60 mM) on the growth and yield of spring safflower exposed to different moisture regimes (non-stress, drought stress, and severe stress) in 2015. The results of this study showed that the application of nanoparticles decreases the negative effects of drought stress. Among nanoparticles, the application of nano-titanium improved the amount of chlorophyll index, concentration of protein, ash and oil, moisture content, α-amylase activity and canopy temperatures by 11. 45, 28. 68, 15. 47, 14, 38. 02, 16. 38 and 16. 71 percent, respectively. The highest amounts of linoleic and oleic fatty acids were observed in 50 mM nano-titanium treatments and non-application of nanoparticles under drought stress conditions. It can be concluded that application of nanoparticles, especially nano-titanium, may have a positive effect on reducing the effects of drought stress and improve the quality and quantity of safflower seed oil.

Drought stress is one of the most important limiting factors for cultivation and production of grapes in the world and Iran. To study the effect of drought stress on some physiological traits of three cultivars, i. e. ‘ Fakhri’ , ‘ Molaei’ and ‘ Ghalati’ , a factorial experiment in completely randomized design with three soil water potential treatments. i. e.-0. 2 (control),-0. 7 and-1. 2 MPa was implemented in greenhouse conditions in 2016. In this study, non-grafted grape vines were placed in large 26-liter pots filled with a clay loam textured soil. According to the results of this study, both levels of stress had a significant effect on dry matter to leaf area ratio, cell membrane stability, chlorophyll, proline, and soluble carbohydrates concertation, leaf relative water content, catalase and peroxidase activities. Soluble carbohydrates concentration showed a significant increase of 47 percent compared to control (10. 57 mg g-1 DM) in-1. 2 MPa stress level. Drought stress decreased the RWC (2 Percent) and increased proline (9 Percent) and malondialdehyde (55 percent) concentration, the peroxidase (15 to 20 percent) and catalase activity (9 Percent). The highest and the lowest chlorophyll concentrations were observed in ‘ Ghalati’ (1. 63 mg g-1 FM) and ‘ Fakhri’ (1. 31 mg g-1 FM), respectively. In conclusion, ‘ Ghalati’ cultivar had higher potential to withstand drought stress conditions than ‘ Molaei’ and ‘ Fakhri’ cultivars.

In recent decades cultivation of plants as a tool to manage the polluted areas by heavy metals has received an increased attention. In order to evaluate the possibility of using Four o’ clock plant as a phytoremediator in soils polluted by Cu and Pb, an experiment was conducted using four levels of Cu and Pb (0, 200, 400, and 800 mg/kg) concentrations, as a factorial experiment based on a completely random design in the Research Greenhouse of Shahid Bahonar University of Kerman, Iran. Results showed that pollution by each of these metals alters photosynthetic pigments concentration and morphological traits of plants. Stomatal characteristics were significantly decreased by these heavy metals. Significant increases were also found in concentration of reducing sugars and proline, Pb and Cu accumulation in stems and roots and also activities of antioxidative enzymes. High levels of metal accumulation were found in roots. Compared to the control condition, plants which were grown under the highest levels of pollutions accumulated 32 and 22 times more Cu and Pb, respectively, in root tissue and 6 and 3. 6 times more in the shoot tissue. Superoxide dismutase, catalase and ascorbate peroxidase activities were also increased up to 2. 7, 2. 5 and 2. 4 times in plants grown in the soil polluted with the highest level of both metals. Meanwhile, proline concentration increased 9 times in plants grown under the same conditions. These Results showed that this species can be used as a Cu and Pb tolerant ornamental plant in Cu and Pb polluted conditions.

In order to detect the reaction of different potato genotypes to different irrigation regimes and evaluate their water productivity, a research was carried out as a split plot experiment based on a randomized complete block design with three replications in Agricultural Research Center and Natural Resources of Ardabil, Iran in 2015-2016. Five potato genotypes (Agria, Caesar, Savalan, 397081-1 and 397082-10) and three irrigation regimes (normal irrigation, 15 and 30 days without irrigation after 75 days of normal irrigation) were considered as treatments. The results showed that the effect of irrigation cuttings on the genotypes was significant for the mean fresh weight of tuber, number of tubers per plant, tuber yield per unit area, total dry matter yield and harvest index, marketable yield, dry matter percentage of tuber and water use efficiency. Under water stress conditions, water use efficiency was increased on the basis of tuber yield per unit area and marketable yield in genotypes 397081-1, Agria and 397082-10. The highest water use efficiency was observed based on harvest index in Caesar and Agria genotypes (54. 29 and 49. 29 percent, respectively), and also based on the percentage of dry matter of tubers in genotypes 397081-1, Caesar and Agria (6, 9 and 26 percent, respectively). When producing the highest tuber yield and water use efficiency under drought stress is aimed at planting genotypes 1-397081, agria and 397082-10 may bring about an effective use of water and show better growth and yield.

In order to investigate the effects of sulfuric acid, humic acid and potassium nitrate foliar spraying on quantitative and qualitative of marigold a field trial was conducted in Ramin Agriculture and Natural Resources University of Khuzestan, Iran in 2015-2016. This study was carried out using a split factorial experiment in a randomized complete block design with four replications. Treatments included potassium nitrate (N1=no application, N2=250 ppm and N3= 500 ppm) as the main factor, sulfuric acid (S1=no application and S2=5 L/ha) and humic acid (H1=no application and H2=16 kg/ha) as the second factor. Studied traits included capitol diameter, number of ray flowers in inflorescences, total number of inflorescences per m, fresh and dry weight of inflorescences, harvest index, petal carotenoid concentrations, antioxidant activity and petal color quality (L*a*b parameters). The highest inflorescence dry weight (53 g m 2 (372), number of ray flowers in inflorescences (58) and harvest index (14%) were detected in N2S1, N2S2, N2S2, N2S1 and N1H2, respectively. The least antioxidant activity (0. 048 mg ml-2 ), fresh and dry weight of inflorescences (380 g m-2 ), total number of inflorescences per m 2 ) was obtained in S1H2. The highest a (5. 23) and L (61. 64) color parameters for yellow flowers and b (84. 44) color parameter for orange flowers were found in N1S1H1, N3S2H2 and N2H2, respectively. In general, the best treatments for the two important traits of inflorescence dry matter yield and number of inflorescences per square meter were N2S1 and N2S2, respectively.

Today, nondestructive methods are widely used to determine the quality of agricultural products. Meanwhile, visible and near-infrared (Vis/NIR) spectroscopy is regarded as one of the most widely used methods in the field of quality assessment of agricultural products. In this study, a system was developed to measure the Vis/NIR spectra of tomato fruit samples in the half-transmittance mode of measurement. Halogen lamps were used as the sources of irradiation and a portable fiber optic spectrometer was utilized to collect the spectra in the range of 400-100 nm. Immediately after collecting the spectra of 170 tomato samples, harvested at different stages of ripening, the firmness of the samples was measured using the standard Magness-Taylor penetration test. In order to eliminate the effects of irregular factors, different preprocessing methods were applied to the collected spectra. Then, partial least squares (PLS) regression was implemented to develop the firmness predictive models. Preliminary results showed two absorption peaks around 670 and 990 nm in the acquired spectra that were related to the chlorophyll and water contents of tomato, respectively. The spectroscopy method could nondestructively predict the tomato fruit firmness with a correlation coefficient (rp) of 0. 920 and the root mean squares error of prediction (RMSEP) of 2. 5 nm.

The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of glycerol (GL) and salicylic acid (SA) on freezing tolerance of Iranian Petunia (Petunia hybrida). For this purpose, a factorial experiment based on completely randomized design with three replications was conducted under controlled conditions. The first factor was temperature (0 and-4 ° C) and the second factor was spraying with anti-stress compounds (24 hours prior to freezing) consisting of control (distilled water), salicylic acid (75 and 150 mg per liter), glycerol (0. 1, 0. 25, 0. 5 and 1 percent) and the combined treatment of 150 mg/l SA+ 0. 25% GL, 150 mg/l SA+ 0. 5% GL, 200 mg/l SA+ 0. 25% GL and anti-frost trade agent with concentration of 4 percent. The results of this study showed that under freezing stress conditions, SA and GL reduced the percentage of visual damage and electrolyte leakage and increased concentration of proline, and total carbohydrates, total phenols and antioxidant activity as compared to control plants. The percentage of visual damage in plants treated with 150 mg/l of SA + 0. 5% GL at-4 ° C was 3. 33%, while the percentage of visual damage of control plants and those treated with anti-frost trade agent were 57. 61 and 22. 88 percent, respectively. The highest proline concentration was obtained from application of 150 mg/l of SA + 0. 25% GL at-4 ° C temperature. The results of this study showed that the use of SA and GL reduced the freezing-induced damage in Iranian Petunia through the improvement of physiological indices.

This study was conducted having the goal of investigating the effects of Methyl Jasmonate on germination, growth and development indices and fruit yield in melon cultivars through two experiments separately performed at Labarotary and Research Station of Agricultural College, Shahid Bahonar University of Kerman in 2011. Germination test was conducted as a factorial experiment on the basis of completely randomized design with seed soaking in Methyl jasmonate at 5 levels (0, 1. 25, 2. 5, 5 and 10 μ M), two levels of the cultivar (Shapasandi and Annanasi), four replications and each replication consisting 500 seeds. The field experiment was performed as split split plot using randomized complete blocks with seed soaking in methyl jasmonate at three levels (0, 5 and 10 μ M), spraying jasmonate at two levels (0 and 5 μ M) and ethephon spraying at two levels (0 and 300 ppm) with four replications. The results of germination experiment demonstrated that the highest germination percentage (81. 6%) and germination rate (6. 74 seeds/day) was related to the 5 μ M concentration of methyl jasmonate. Shapasandi cultivar had superiority over Annanasi cultivar. In the field experiment, the Jasmonat pre-treatment increased leaf area in Shapasandi cultivar by 39. 2%. It was showed that the chlorophyll index (7. 7%), leaf number (19. 2%), as well as the number of fruits (40%) were increased in the presence of 5 μ M of jasmonate. The 5μ M seed pretreatment was superior to Jasmonat spraying in terms of increasing the fruit yield. Jasmonat spraying increased fruit weight and flesh thickness in Shapasandi cultivar. Seed pretreatment with 5μ M jasmonate can be recommended for increasing the yield of Shapasandi and Annanasi cultivars.

Nutrition of fruit trees during the growing season plays an important role in growth, fruitfulness and fruit quality. Given the increasing application of bio-stimulators as one of the most important approaches towards sustainable agriculture, some bio-stimulators were applied to elucidate their effects on vegetative characteristics and leaf mineral content of apricot trees cv. “ Shekarpareh” in the spring of 2015 in Abarkuh, Yazd, Iran. The experiment was conducted based on a randomized complete blocks design with four replications on 8-years-old trees. Seven treatments of foliar applications, included control (spraying with water), Humic acid (0. 1 or 0. 2% v/v); Humiforte™ (0. 05 or 0. 1% v/v) and Aminol forte (0. 3 or 0. 6% v/v) that were applied twice including two weeks after full bloom and a month after the first spray. The results showed that bio-stimulators significantly affected current season’ s growth (branches length and diameter), leaves macro and micronutrients contents, except for potassium (P=0. 003), while there was no significant effect on chlorophyll content. The highest branch length (115 cm) and the lowest branch diameter (9. 71 cm) were obtained by the application of Aminol forte 0. 3% v/v. The highest leaves content of N (2. 46%) and P (0. 14%) were achieved by applying Humiforte 0. 1%, while the highest content of leaves micronutrients were observed following the application of Humic acid at 0. 2% v/v. It appears that applying Aminol forte 0. 3% and Humic acid 0. 2% at two weeks after full bloom and one month following the first application could promote vegetative growth and mineral content of apricot trees.

The application of edible coatings is one of the most innovative methods to extend the commercial shelf-life of fruits and vegetables by acting as a gas barrier. In this study, the effects of chitosan, thymus essential oil and their combination in extending shelf life of grape (‘ Bidaneh Ghermez’ ) and quality properties were investigated. Grapes were harvested when were fully ripened and their total soluble solid (TSS) was about 25% and immediately transferred to laboratory. Then fruit treated by 0. 5% and 1% (w/v) solution of chitosan, 150 and 300 µ l/l thymus essential oil and their combination (untreated fruit were as control). After treatments, grapes were packed in 200g packages and stored at 0-2 º C and 90% ± 5 RH for 60 days. Changes in weight loss, color, pH, TSS, decay and sensory quality were measured in ten-day intervals until 60 days after the treatments. Results showed that chitosan and essential oil treatment significantly decreased weight loss, decay, color change, shrivel and berry shatter in comparison to the control. According to the panelists’ votes, treated fruits did not show significant difference to the non-treated control fruits. It seems that among different treatments examined, the combined treatment of chitosan and thymus essential oil was more suitable for maintaining the fruit quality.

To evaluate the effect of herbicide band application and cultivator on weed control, yield and yield components of potato, an experiment was conducted using factorial arrangement based on randomized complete block design (RCBD) with four replications at Research Field of Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Mashhad, Iran during 2015. Experimental factors included cultivator at two levels (with and without cultivator application) and herbicide treatments at six levels, including 1. Pre plant herbicide application (Pendimethalin) + broadcast application of post emergence herbicide (Metribuzine), 2. Pre plant herbicide application (Pendimethalin) + band application of post emergence herbicide (Metribuzine), 3. Pre plant herbicide (Pendimethalin) alone, 4. Broadcast application of post emergence herbicide (Metribuzine) alone, 5. Band application of post emergence herbicide (Metribuzine) alone, and no herbicide treatment. The results showed that application of Pendimethalin + broadcast or band application of Metribuzine reduced total weed density and total weed biomass and increased tuber weight, tuber number and total biomass of potato. The highest tuber yield was observed in Pendimethalin + broadcast (41 ton ha-1) and band application of Metribuzine (36 ton ha-1), and the lowest tuber yield was observed in no herbicide (16 ton ha-1) and Pendimethalin alone (18. 75 ton ha-1). It was concluded that interaction of cultivator and herbicide application had no significant effect on total weed density, total weed biomass and tuber and biomass yield of potato, due perhaps to inadequate repeat of cultivator application.

In order to study yield, yield components and agronomic efficiency of phosphorus in soybean affected by simultaneous placement of nitrogen with phosphorus, an experiment was carried out under moisture stress conditions, at Agricultural Research Station of Bu Ali Sina University, Hamedan, Iran in 2017 in a factorial split plot based on randomized complete block design with three replications. The first factor of moisture stress which was placed in the main plots included three levels of irrigation after 60, 90 and 120 mm evaporation, and two factors of nitrogen (in two levels of placement and no placement) and phosphorus (in two levels of placement and no-application) were appointed to sub plots. The results showed that with nitrogen placement the number of pods per plant and the number of seeds per pod were increased by 8 and 16. 21%, respectively. Nitrogen placement with phosphorus increased grain yield by 11. 4% compared to non-placement of nitrogen with phosphorus and yielded 3855 kg/ha. Nitrogen placement at irrigation after 60, 90 and 120 mm evaporation increased phosphorus agronomic efficiency by 14. 3, 27. 6 and 35. 4%, respectively. Oil yield was increased by placing nitrogen with phosphorus at irrigation after 60 mm evaporation, by 19. 7%, compared to phosphorus alone treatment. In general, nitrogen placing with phosphorus at all irrigation levels increased grain and oil yields and reduced the negative effect of moisture stress on soybeans.

The roots of the madder plant (Rubinia tinctorum) contain some pigments that can be used to produce the red dyes. In order to study the effect of salinity on alterations in the amount of plant pigment an experiment was conducted according to a completely randomized design with three replications. Based on the CIE XYZ color space model designed close to human color vision, the results showed that increasing soil salinity decreased the value of The lightness value parameter (L*), but the A* (redness and greenness) and B* (yellowness and blueness) values were increased with increasing soil salinity up to the level of 8 dSm. There was a significant positive correlation between A* value and Ca + Mg and a significant negative correlation between L* value and Ca+Mg at the 5% level. Fitting three nonlinear regression model to data, simulated and described the variation of colorimetric specification of woolen samples dyed under different madder dyes and salinity conditions. These models proved to be an appropriate and reasonable link between madder growth conditions and colorimetric specification of woolen samples dyed such as L*, A* and B* values. Due to the high resistant characteristics of madder to salinity, increasing salinity in the madder root zone lead to acceptable quality and efficiency of pigment production and to expand the possibilities for economic production of Rubinia tinctorum in soil salinity in the central arid region of Iran.